Sony and Nintendo pegged with lawsuit from vague controller patent

Copper Innovations Group has a bone to pick with Sony and Nintendo, and has filed a lawsuit in Pennsylvania seeking after some monies and an injunction against further infringement. The patent in question? Copper has a patent dating back to 1996 that "covers a method for connecting devices to a system and sorting their inputs by means of hardware identification numbers tied to each transmission." Sounds like it would cover just about any sort of controller ever, but the lawsuit apparently is referring to Bluetooth -- Microsoft, which uses a proprietary wireless standard for the 360, isn't being named in the suit. No official word from Sony or Nintendo yet, but Sony lawyers could be heard crying softly into a pillow somewhere.

[CUBSWILLWIN @ Jan 12th 2008 11:16PM]

peg is a funny word....peg,peg,peg....

[ChrisG @ Jan 13th 2008 12:18AM]

and what grade are you in? lol

[Oliver strano @ Jan 13th 2008 12:25AM]

Been watching a little too much scrubs have we CUBSWILLWIN

[ssuk @ Jan 14th 2008 12:18PM]

Who has two thumbs and doesn't give a crap? SSUK. I thought we'd met?

[scientist369 @ Jan 12th 2008 11:31PM]

haha say goodbye to the future of wireless systems

[ChrisG @ Jan 13th 2008 12:23AM]

not necessarily. did u even read this? He said they're suing against bluetooth. And I'm pretty sure that not every wireless peripheral known to man uses a bluetooth connection. All Nintendo and Sony have to do is go the Microsoft route and make there own proprietary wireless standard or they can use infrared, which is so so, or anything using a radio frequency that isn't blue tooth.

[aguiluz @ Jan 13th 2008 12:31AM]

What a vague patent! Vague items can be interpreted a zillion of ways! Oh, well. Bye bye Wi-Fi and your WPA2. Bye Bye Bluetooth with your sneaky transmitter. Bye Bye wireless keyboard and mouse with your *encrypted* data. Bye.... Ah, what the hell am I talking about?

[aguiluz @ Jan 13th 2008 12:34AM]

Looks like "Copper" is just jealous. Suckers!

[Andrew Jones @ Jan 13th 2008 1:41AM]

Sketchy at best - why are they selectively enforcing their patents, and why have they chosen to wait 12 years to push for ANY reward at all? USB also transmits a unique device ID (actually made up of several parts - an ID specific to a manufacturer, an ID specific to a product, and a serial number for the physical device). Their lawyers should also be able to note that the TCP/IP stack is prior art, including the unique MAC address with every packet. There's also the ISA and PCI buses, which ALSO specify a unique ID - although I'm not certain whether it's with every data transmission.

[Kurt MacD @ Jan 13th 2008 2:13AM]

Here's another thing, I'm not entirely sure that bluetooth was around back in 96, the earliest date I could find referring to bluetooth was 98. Odd eh?..

[Azayzel @ Jan 13th 2008 8:06AM]

What utter BS! The judge needs to dissolve the patent as it's simply an idea and not merely a novel one; which is the definition of a patentable idea. If you think about it wifi uses the same strategy; i.e., assigning a device a specific number and doling things out where they belong. These guys must have been filing patent after patent of simple ideas hoping to inevitably sue some other company based upon a vagary. Research needs to be done to see if they've ever even marketed a device based upon one of these ideas; if not, kick 'em in the nuts!

[eM @ Jan 13th 2008 10:21AM]

@ChrisG:

"He said they're suing against bluetooth."

That's what the Engadget and GamesIndustry authors said. However, the bloggers' understanding of patents is severely lacking.

The abstract (which is what the Engadget author quotes) is irrelevant -- it does not define the invention or what is claimed. Instead, *the claims* are what the patent owner owns. And the claims are substantially more specific than the title or the abstract or the description.

Of course, actually bothering to read source material or research a story is way beyond Engadget's mission. When falsehoods score more pageviews, why bother with the truth?

[Mike10010100 @ Jan 13th 2008 10:31AM]

@crisg

I may be confused, but i thought that the wii remote was found to have had a wifi chip when they ripped it open.

may just be me

[ark_v2 @ Jan 12th 2008 11:31PM]

Do you actually think it'll proceed?
It's ridiculous.

[ChrisG @ Jan 13th 2008 12:33AM]

well i doubt it will be taken into full effect, unless other companies that use that standard are held for liability and sued. If Sony and Nintendo lose, they'd be hurt bad and would have to find a new wireless technology to use or have some cash settlement. I think its pretty ironic how Sony's always sued for technology used in there controllers. Remember the whole lawsuit over the Dual Shock controllers, in the end Sony was able to make an agreement and paid a lot to bring Dual Shock 3 to the PS3.

[ark_v2 @ Jan 13th 2008 12:41AM]

This is not about the Bluetooth. It's about the LEDs and the numbers in the controllers.

[Robert in Texas @ Jan 13th 2008 1:46AM]

So just use "hardware identification LETTERS" instead of "hardware identification NUMBERS" and get around it.

[giuliop @ Jan 13th 2008 6:12AM]

There are no "LETTERS" in hardware.

[Ayle @ Jan 12th 2008 11:34PM]

So they are suing Sony and Nintendo for using a wireless technology that they have not invented? WTF??? And what kind of vague patent is that? That description pretty much includes every type of connection(bluetooth, wifi, gsm, etc, etc) that allows you to connect several devices to one....

[ChrisG @ Jan 13th 2008 1:08AM]

dude you got it a little wrong. The no name company is suing Sony and Nintendo for the way that the used bluetooth. Instead of just having a PAN connection through blue tooth, Sony and Nintendo use communication (i.e. sixaxis, or the wii-mote) through bluetooth in order to uses the controllers. I guess that's why Microsoft made there own proprietary wireless connections for the 360 controllers.

[Ignatius @ Jan 12th 2008 11:49PM]

A no-name company coming out of the woodwork to sue a successful one for patent violations of a very all-inclusive patent?

Not in a million years!

Oh wait, that's right... this isn't Bizarro world.

[ChrisG @ Jan 13th 2008 12:35AM]

dude where have you been? this crap happens almost all the time. Remember the whole suit against the OLPC keyboards and stuff.

[Reader @ Jan 13th 2008 3:47AM]

Rofl the classic

joke
head

Curious if they'll ever reform the ridiculous patent system.

[Ignatius @ Jan 13th 2008 8:46AM]

Chris, you um... you know I was being sarcastic, right?

[mike @ Jan 13th 2008 12:06AM]

Everyone knows your frivolous lawsuit should always be based out of Texas...

[austin @ Jan 13th 2008 12:06AM]

nintendo uses bluetooth?

[Derek @ Jan 13th 2008 12:23AM]

You didn't know? How else do you think all these brilliant people on YouTube have connected their Wii remotes to their computers and created really cool modifications?

[austin @ Jan 13th 2008 1:21AM]

looking at my wiimote, i dont see any bluetooth badging anywhere.

[Nick @ Jan 13th 2008 3:13AM]

And you don't have an esophagus cause I don't see a picture of one tattooed on your forearm.

[AoMoe @ Jan 13th 2008 2:01AM]

The march of the trolls continue.

[Tiptup300 @ Jan 13th 2008 12:40AM]

Shouldn't patent gremlins be like sued, they're worse than monopolies!

[Tiptup300 @ Jan 13th 2008 12:41AM]

Shouldn't patent gremlins be like sued, they're worse than monopolies!

[FordGTGuy @ Jan 13th 2008 12:44AM]

Microsoft the only company not being sued over a vague patent this week? I guess there is a first for everything.

[ChrisG @ Jan 13th 2008 1:10AM]

re-read it. Microsoft doesn't use blu-tooth for controllers!!

[John P @ Jan 13th 2008 12:37PM]

You are sort of slow on the uptake when it comes to sarcasm, Chris.

[JohnTitor @ Jan 13th 2008 12:49AM]

Dear Engadget, why is my RSS doubling up?

[Towerz @ Jan 13th 2008 1:00AM]

Wow, really? Really? What is this crap, that patent could mean anything.

[glenn s @ Jan 13th 2008 1:46AM]

Small company nobody has ever heard of suing Sony: a long shot.
Small company nobody has ever heard of suing Nintendo: slightly less of a long shot.

Small company nobody has ever heard of suing Sony AND Nintedo: hahahahahahahahahahahahaha!!!! Ever see a freight train hit a car?

[Mark E. @ Jan 13th 2008 1:52AM]

Huh. Bluetooth was originally conceived in 1994, which is two years before this patent. I believe the law has a little something to say about prior art.

[eM @ Jan 13th 2008 10:28AM]

That might be relevant if the patent were claiming Bluetooth. It's not, despite illiterates' voiced beliefs otherwise.

[Mark E. @ Jan 13th 2008 11:26AM]

Right, but the Bluetooth spec most certainly includes what this patent covers: a method of distinguishing between several different transmitting devices through use of a identification number.

[ethana2 @ Jan 13th 2008 2:05AM]

My views on patents:

Intent to implement?
No?
FAIL. Revoked.
Yes?
7 years. Hurry it up.
Prior art?
Sorry folks, up for grabs.
Software?
No.

[Wwhat @ Jan 13th 2008 3:39AM]

Don't you love the name of the company? how they sneaked 'innovations' in there, yeah right innovations..
And of course it's a 'group', so typical.

[alex @ Jan 13th 2008 3:50AM]

"copper"? as in "one who cops (steals)"?

ok, it wasn't THAT clever. :/

[skulldriveshaft @ Jan 13th 2008 5:22AM]

and the bluetooth version of nintendo has it's OWN unique way of talking and transmitting data PLUS it also receives AUDIO!

Bluetooth headset manufacturers are gonna be pissed!

Sorry you're not allowed to pair your devices anymore with numbers, letters okay?

Did they reverse engineer the wiimotes to find out how the stack was being put together? or do we have some white papers in public domain somewhere? are they using other people's research into communicating with the wiimote based on the blusoleil bluetooth adapter?

Johnny is gonna be pissed if some of his research and insights have been used for discovery.

Then again I would imagine that trolling has become the scapegoat for every lame R&D department, doesn't the ORDER in which data is constructed a logical process??? someone just thought it would make sense to organize the structure like that.

That's like saying the way to make a cheeseburger is patentable based on the order in which you assemble it.

So I went wandering the internets, this is what I could dredge up:

----- excerpts -------

They claim that Nintendo and Sony are infringing on their patent for a “Hand Held Computer Input Apparatus and Method”.

You can read the DOCKET here:

http://dockets.justia.com/docket/court-pawdce/case_no-2:2007cv01752/case_id-84069/

I don't have a PACER account, so I can't view the information contained in the filing.

I'm trolling the patent database right now - 803 hits come up - I found these ones:

6,086,373 Method of cleaning teeth with a toothbrush with improved cleaning and abrasion efficiency.

4,599,820 Method and apparatus for selecting fishing lure color.

3,933,128 Steam generation with coal.

7,226,582 Sunscreen compositions and methods of use.

This is one of the most recent ones:

URL DELETED BECAUSE I CAN ONLY HAVE 3 URLS!

I couldn't find one that said Hand Held, now Sony is going to eat shit because they classify their system as a computer, Nintendo on the other hand doesn't really categorize the Wii as a computer.

Nevermind, I found some more stuff...

After some more digging, I found the fucking patent.

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.htm&r=0&f=S&l=50&d=PTXT&RS=IN%2Fcopper&Refine=Refine+Search&Refine=Refine+Search&Query=IN%2Fcopper+and+innovations

It appears as this company was solely formed because of these two patents, or was absorbed because of this by another, anyways, here's something to pick your brains.

Because the two patents were updated, changed, etc, etc, within one year, this just looks like the aggregation of everyone's ideas at that time across the world, and sharing it with others, but these guys (3 of them I think) put in an update to their patent to cover pretty much EVERYTHING people were talking about at the time :[

"Finally, the invention has incorporated many ergonomically advantageous human-computer interactions, such as the creation of a device which can be manipulated by a human user's natural pointing finger to select and control functions of a computer or other apparatus without having to be close to the apparatus being controlled."

Can you say GUN?!?! as in the Nintendo GUN! used for DUCK HUNT! way before this thing, and it just had to dangle a cord, not that far of a stretch to turn those impulses into wireless signal, we could have had IR and RF controllers back then, but we were alright with wires.

You can get a short history of Nintendo here :]

http://www.ncecbvi.org/students/keith/Nintendo.html

DON'T CRASH THE SMALL SERVER!!!!!!!!

1985 - Nintendo started to sell the U.S. version of Family Computer Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in America. The system included R.O.B. (Robotic Operating Buddy) and the games Duck Hunt and Super Mario Bros. Mario and Luigi became as big a hit as the NES.

1988 - Nintendo of America Inc. published the first issue of Nintendo Power Magazine in July. It researched and developed the Hands Free Controller, making the NES assessable to many more Nintendo fans. The game library for NES grew to 65 titles, helping to broaden the demographics to include more adults

Skipping back to the patent(s) in question:

Scroll down to about half way, where they say OBJECTS OF INVENTION, and you can read something that pretty much covers EVERYTHING UNDER THE FUCKING SUN THAT SENDS AND RECEIVES A SIGNAL :[

What the hell is that term called? logical / natural discovery? damn it I can't remember right now, it's too late :|

Click on the IMAGES button in the patent page and go take a look at the whole 44 pages of the application in fine print - it's just a patent for their OWN controller that nobody wanted to use.

To the person yapping about the LED's etc, sorry, that's not even close, it refers to the confirmation that a signal is being sent, and another LED blinking to show low battery. Pretty much 50% of universal remotes have that blinking LED showing you that something is being transmitted. Go see how many remotes you have that blink, I know my car remote has a flashing LED on it.

Just because Nintendo and SONY thought it would be nice to give you a little light saying what player you are, so sad.

Nintendo is lucky they can't make enough to ship, so why not just hold shipments for America a little longer while the judge throws out this case.

There REALLY should be some onus on Copper to PROVE that their idea got jacked, but guess what, it's 10 years ago. No wonder many companies outright pass on America due to the volume of litigation alone.

Conversely, I imagine Nintendo and SONY suing Copper Innovations Group instead for incorporating their controller, hell, I bet ATARI would have something to say about that paddle as well.

Overall, I would imagine Logitech and other presentation pointer manufacturers bracing for impact.

[eM @ Jan 13th 2008 10:28AM]

That's nice. But the *claims* are the only part of the patent that count. The inventors could copy and paste Hamlet into the description if they so chose without affecting their legal rights, derived from the claims, in any way.

[skulldriveshaft @ Jan 14th 2008 3:53AM]

@eM:

Please READ the patents, there are two of them, one is an update of another. And it appears that a single person updated it, persumably buying out the other two partners?

I would imagine the other two people, if they are still alive, should now come out of the woodwork and lay claim to the prior art of this patent.

The patent does not indicate that their device lit up a specific LED based on it's designation. Their device only had TWO LED's, one to show the bursting of the transmitter, the other to indicate battery level. ANYTHING beyond that is purely derived from logical processes, because having a flow chart showcase the logic gates required for the system just doesn't cut it.

Many people here would have come to the same, if not identical, logic path required.

How would you organize the information coming to or going out from a wireless device?

Spend a few minutes trying to figure out a way of sending information that would correlate what you do with a device in your hand and a receiver.

Make a flowchart even, the design of your transmitted signal will be dictated by the logic design of your receiver.

Thats why you have to press start every time your load up a game on a console, it initializes everything, looks for controllers connected, asks for everyone who is playing to hit a button as well when the appropriate screen comes up. Notice on the GameCube that until someone selects a player, the other person can still control the cursor on screen, requiring some patience and cooperation when starting.

Programmers structure things like this, hell even BASIC forced you to use this type of system.

They didn't stick hamlet in there okay, they stuck in EVERYTHING that they could aggregate from publications and discussions at that time.

Now they think that because a controller has a light on it that shows transmission, and a battery level light as well, that their 10 year old device has some bearing on today's design. I can guarantee that NOBODY who was making this thing has EVER laid eyes on this kind of patent, or even bothered to go look it up.

SONY and NINTENDO designed their controllers in a closed space, specifically to communicate with their hardware, and no-one else's. They did their best at using off the shelf components and existing technology to ensure the delivery of a cost effective wireless controller, with bluetooth, of all things. The structure of the data was dictated by the protocol used, otherwise there could be no pairing of the hardware.

The comment that "THEY ARE SUING BLUETOOTH" is definitely a shot in the right direction, the stack itself dictates how the information will be structured. The biggest user of this type of data encapsulation and structure is TCP/IP, and the millions of routers, switches, hubs, etc that receive, decode, and transmit.

I'm pretty tired, so I hope what I typed makes sense people, the patent only had similarities with remote control devices as far as I am concerned.

Like TV-B-GONE

[tuntis @ Jan 13th 2008 9:22AM]

This is just fail.

[Hraefn @ Jan 13th 2008 9:34AM]

There really needs to be a law to protect companies from patent trolls. Much as most people dislike huge, money-grubbing companies, money-grubbing patent trolls are worse. =/

[Barry @ Jan 13th 2008 6:04PM]

I'd like it if once per week, a patent troll is randomly selected and drawn and quartered in a public square, just like back in ye olde days. I'd take that over 'Lost' any day. I'd buy the whole season on DVD.